When news of the war broke out in 1914, nothing could prepare the citizens of Bath for the changes that would envelop their city over the next four years. The story of Bath in the Great War is both an interesting and intriguing one. This book covers this historic city's involvement from the commencement of the Great War in July 1914, to the Armistice in November 1918, describing in great detail what happened to the city and its people, including their everyday lives, entertainment, spies and the internment of aliens living within the city. Bath played a key role in the deployment of troops to Northern Europe as well as supplying vital munitions. Local men responded keenly to recruitment drives and thousands of soldiers were billeted in the city before being sent off to fight the enemy overseas. The city also played a vital role caring for the many wounded soldiers who returned home from the front. As the end of the war was announced there were tremendous celebrations in the streets, but the effects of war lasted for years to come. By the end of the conflict, there wasn't a family in Bath who hadn't lost a son, father, nephew, uncle or brother.Bath features many forgotten news stories of the day and includes a considerable collection of rare photographs last seen in newspapers nearly 70 years ago.

The Little Book of The East End is a funny, fast-paced, fact-packed compendium of the sort of frivolous, fantastic or simply strange information which no-one will want to be without. Here we find out about the most unusual crimes and punishments, eccentric inhabitants, famous sons and daughters and literally hundreds of wacky facts (plus some authentically bizarre bits of historic trivia). A reference book and a quirky guide, this can be dipped in to time and time again to reveal something new about the people, the heritage, the secrets and the enduring fascination of the original home of the Cockney which is now far more diverse. A wonderful package and essential reading for visitors and locals alike.

The First Migrants recounts the largely unknown story of Black people who migrated from the South to the Great Plains between 1877 and 1920 in search of land and freedom. They exercised their rights under the Homestead Act to gain title to 650,000 acres, settling in all of the Great Plains states. Some created Black homesteader communities such as Nicodemus, Kansas, and DeWitty, Nebraska, while others, including George Washington Carver and Oscar Micheaux, homesteaded alone. All sought a place where they could rise by their own talents and toil, unencumbered by Black codes, repression, and violence. In the words of one Nicodemus descendant, they found “a place they could experience real freedom,� though in a racist society that freedom could never be complete. Their quest foreshadowed the epic movement of Black people out of the South known as the Great Migration. In this first account of the full scope of Black homesteading in the Great Plains, Richard Edwards and Jacob K. Friefeld weave together two distinct strands: the narrative histories of the six most important Black homesteader communities and the several themes that characterize homesteaders’ shared experiences. Using homestead records, diaries and letters, interviews with homesteaders’ descendants, and other sources, Edwards and Friefeld illuminate the homesteaders’ fierce determination to find freedom—and their greatest achievements and struggles for full equality.  

Between the outbreak of the Second World War and the end of the century, life changed dramatically for the working-class people of the Black Country. Having survived the hardships of war, they found themselves facing a slew of social issues, all the while playing a vital role in manufacturing to stabilise the country's struggling economy. Innovations such as the wireless, television and cinema also brought huge societal changes that would move them closer to the present day. As well as a nostalgic look at the past, this book details the appalling health conditions, pollution, morality and crime in the region, before finally taking a look at the decline of crucial industries. Tom Larkin takes us back to the good old days and asks the question - whatever happened to the real Black Country? The author's royalties are being donated to the Wolverhampton charity Let Us Play.

Suffolk is a county renowned for the beauty of its many parish churches, but for the average visitor the physical language in which they speak, that of stained glass, engraved fonts, and hammer-beamed roofs, is bewildering. Now available in an updated, single volume, the Guide to Suffolk Churches provides a way into this fascinating world, its architecture and history. From bells to pulpits to centuries-old graffiti found in window sills, each church unfolds from sealed tome to open book in Mortlock's hands. Accompanying the entries there is an extensive glossary/index and two useful appendices. From carvings of woodwoses to weeping chancels, the meaning of idiosyncracies and uniformities alike across the county are laid out in clear, engaging prose. New photographs, line drawings, and a detailed map ensure that neither the greatest of artefacts nor the smallest of churches can be accidentally overlooked.Written in a voice as knowledgeable as it is enthusiastic about Suffolk and its churches, the guide is incomparable in both the thoroughness and charm with which it unlocks more than one thousand years of history across the county's hundreds of churches. There is no visit to any parish church in Suffolk, no matter how well informed the visitor, that would not be more enjoyable and informative for having Mortlock along. About the author: D.P. Mortlock is Librarian to Viscount Coke at Holkham and was, for 20 years, County Librarian of Norfolk. He is a Fellow of the Library Association and served as an officer in the Indian Army from 1945-7. His recent books include a new edition of 'The Guide to Norfolk Churches', also published by The Lutterworth Press, 'Aristocratic Splendour: Money and the World of Thomas Coke, Earl of Leicester' (Sutton Publishing), and 'Holkham Library: A History and Description' (Roxburghe Club).

New Mexico comes alive in these fascinating stories about events that helped make New Mexico what it is today. From the life and times of Folsom Man (9,000 BC) to the Great Prison Riot of Santa Fe County (1980 AD), It Happened in New Mexico tells the stories of intriguing people and events from the history of one of America's most captivating states. Find out how Pancho Villa's deadly raid on Columbus in March 1916 led to a $130 million-unsuccessful-mission to hunt down America's arch enemy. Go back to July 16, 1945, when a busload of spectators pulled up to a scenic overlook to witness the explosion of the world's first atomic bomb. Find out how Smokey the Bear began life as an imaginary symbol and ended up as the nation's most beloved cub. Did the U.S. Army steal Doc Noss's gold? Join the military cavalcade to Victorio Peak in 1977 and decide for yourself.

This is the third book in the series of historic photographs of the area around Hayes and West Drayton. The publication of two earlier volumes led to the discovery of many more old photographs, mostly from private collections that had never been published before. Together they make up a new collection of photographs that span the 20th century. Most of them cover the first half of this period, but some are more recent and a few are even earlier. They reveal a way of life that is now difficult to imagine. In the words of L.P. Hartley, The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there. Around Hayes and West Drayton: A Third Selection follows the pattern of its predecessors in covering not only Hayes and West Drayton but also Harlington, Harmondsworth, Heathrow, Longford, Sipson and Yiewsley. At the time most of the photographs were taken these were all distinct communities. They now form the southernmost part of the London Borough of Hillingdon, but they still, to some extent, retain their individual identities, and have therefore been described in separate chapters.

Forget what you think you know about the Mafia.  After reading this book, even life-long mob aficionados will have a new perspective on organized crime.

Informative, authoritative, and eye-opening, this is the first full-length book devoted exclusively to uncovering the hidden history of how the Mafia came to dominate organized crime in New York City during the 1930s through 1950s.  Based on exhaustive research of archives and secret files obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, author and attorney C. Alexander Hortis draws on the deepest collection of primary sources, many newly discovered, of any history of the modern mob.

Shattering myths, Hortis reveals how Cosa Nostra actually obtained power at the inception.  The author goes beyond conventional who-shot-who mob stories, providing answers to fresh questions such as:    

* Why did the Sicilian gangs come out on top of the criminal underworld?  
* Can economics explain how the Mafia families operated?  
* What was the Mafia's real role in the drug trade?  
* Why was Cosa Nostra involved in gay bars in New York since the 1930s? 

Drawing on an unprecedented array of primary sources, The Mob and the City is the most thorough and authentic history of the Mafia's rise to power in the early-to-mid twentieth century.

'Fascinating' The Times 'Tantalising . . . Low's conclusion is a valuable one.' The Telegraph The gripping account of how the Royal family really operates from the man who has spent years studying them in his role as Royal correspondent for The Times. Valentine Low asks the important questions: who really runs the show and, as Charles III begins his reign, what will happen next? Throughout history, the British monarchy has relied on its courtiers - the trusted advisers in the King or Queen's inner circle - to ensure its survival as a family, an ancient institution, and a pillar of the constitution. Today, as ever, a vast team of people hidden from view steers the royal family's path between public duty and private life. Queen Elizabeth II, after a remarkable 70 years of service, saw the final seasons of her reign without her husband Philip to guide her. Meanwhile, newly ascended Charles seeks to define what his future as King, and that of his court, will be. The question of who is entrusted to guide the royals has never been more vital, and yet the task those courtiers face has never been more challenging. With a cloud hanging over Prince Andrew as well as Harry and Meghan's departure from royal life, the complex relationship between modern courtiers and royal principals has been exposed to global scrutiny. As the new Prince and Princess of Wales, William and Kate - equipped with a very 21st century approach to press and public relations - now hold the responsibility of making an ancient institution relevant for the decades to come. Courtiers reveals an ever-changing system of complex characters, shifting values and ideas over what the future of the institution should be. This is the story of how the monarchy really works, at a pivotal moment in its history.

The Little Book of Oxfordshire is a funny, fast-paced, fact-packed compendium of the sort of frivolous, fantastic or simply strange information which no one will want to be without. Here we find out about the most unusual crimes and punishments, eccentric inhabitants, famous sons and daughters and literally hundreds of wacky facts (plus some authentically bizarre bits of historic trivia). Combining essential facts with little-known, weird and often hilarious trivia, it is an essential purchase for all lovers of the county. Colourful characters and the general mayhem of Oxford history flow through the pages like the iconic Thames, Isis and Cherwell rivers. Dip in and celebrate!

London has always been a bustling place of trade; once the docks teemed with men, ships and goods from all over the world. Now all has been transformed: starting at Canary Wharf and continuing at the Royal Docks, a vibrant new area has sprung into existence providing commerce, housing, shops and restaurants. In London's Docklands the author takes you on a journey though the historical development of the area. He outlines life at the docks, the troubled industrial relations, their heyday as the hub of the Empire's trade and their eventual demise. Discover a collection of unique buildings, hidden tunnels, pioneering voyages and historical riverside pubs.

In James Bretz's Mansions of Denver, the charm and history of Denver's architectural past is carefully and beautifully drawn. His book provides readers with insight into the city's youth. But it is also a lament - an homage to a time when architectural originality prevailed.

The attack on London between 1939 and 1945 is one of the most significant events in the city's modern history, the impact of which can still be seen in its urban and social landscapes. As a key record of the attack, the London County Council Bomb Damage Maps represent destruction on a huge scale, recording buildings and streets reduced to smoke and rubble. The full set of maps is made up of 110 hand-coloured 1:2500 Ordnance Survey base sheets originally published in 1916 but updated by the LCC to 1940. Because they use the 1916 map, they give us a glimpse of a 'lost London', before post-war redevelopment schemes began to shape the modern city. The colouring applied to the maps records a scale of damage to London's built environment during the war - the most detailed and complete survey of destruction caused by the aerial bombardment. A clear and fascinating introduction by expert Laurence Ward sets the maps in the full historical context of the events that gave rise to them, supported by archival photographs and tables of often grim statistics.

Abingdon History Tour is a unique insight into the illustrious history of this Oxfordshire town. This is an exciting guided walk around Abingdon, its well-known streets and striking buildings, and explains what they meant to the people of this town throughout the nineteenth and into the twentieth century. Readers are invited to follow a timeline of events and watch the changing face of Abingdon as Pamela Horn guides us through the local streets.

Old Warwickshire, the ancient heart of England, encompassed many iconic historic sites. Coventry, Rugby, Warwick, Stratford-upon-Avon and Birmingham, among others, all had tales to tell. Equally fascinating are the stories of the people, the virtuous and the villainous, who lived in the greenwoods and rolling hills of this celebrated county. Here are the folk tales passed from teller to listener over centuries, and the legends of the region's famous sons and daughters. From Lady Godiva and Dick Turpin, to the murderous Foxcote Feud and Coventry's claim to Saint George, storyteller Cath Edwards retells these tales and more with verve, vitality and vivid original illustrations.

'A complete rollercoaster romp of a story... Kit has a created cast of heroes and villains whose escapades leave the reader crying with laughter and gasping with horror... But the story also has an emotional depth and poignancy which resonates long after the final page has been turned.' - Ruth Hogan Now if you were a poor Gypsy mush, who'd had a run of bad luck and whose ever-loving was done with managing on thin air, and someone was to offer you a lucrative run of work, what would you do? Okay, so it's not legit, but sometimes it's got to be worth the risk. You could buy your lovely Zilla all that her heart desires, you could stand your rounds at the kitchema without counting the money in your pocket, update your van, put a deposit on a bit of ground to call your own. So you do it, you take the work and you take the risk, but then it all blows up in your face and you've pulled your loved ones into danger. Well worse than danger. And now you're going to have to take yourself away, disappear from sight. Be the undead playing at being dead. By the author of Thursday Nights at the Bluebell Inn, this Own Voices novel reveals, with compassion and humour, the precarious lives of its characters in a story where, sometimes, the mystical and the everyday worlds converge.

The Vale of Taunton Deane was described by John Norden, in 1610, as the 'paradise of England'. Others praised its beauty and its fertile soil, while the Victorians called it the 'golden vale'. The book tells the story of the entire Vale, including the communities surrounding the town of Taunton. Taunton had a market and a mint, before Domesday Book; and from A.D. 904, when Bishop Denewulf acquired the minster and its lands, the manor for nine centuries was a prized possession of the bishops of Winchester.

The first book devoted to this landmark of architecture, urban planning, and social engineering Situated in the borough of Queens, New York, Sunnyside Gardens has been an icon of urbanism and planning since its inception in the 1920s. Not the most beautifully planned community, nor the most elegant, and certainly not the most perfectly preserved, Sunnyside Gardens nevertheless endures as significant both in terms of the planning principles that inspired its creators and in its subsequent history. Why this garden suburb was built and how it has fared over its first century is at the heart of Sunnyside Gardens. Reform-minded architects and planners in England and the United States knew too well the social and environmental ills of the cities around them at the turn of the twentieth century. Garden cities gained traction across the Atlantic before the Great War, and its principles were modified by American pragmatism to fit societal conditions and applied almost as a matter of faith by urban planners for much of the twentieth century. The designers of Sunnyside- Clarence Stein, Henry Wright, Frederick Ackerman, and landscape architect Marjorie Cautley-crafted a residential community intended to foster a sense of community among residents. Richly illustrated throughout with historic and contemporary photographs as well as architectural plans of the houses, blocks, and courts, Sunnyside Gardens first explores the planning of Sunnyside, beginning with the English garden-city movement and its earliest incarnations built around London. Chapters cover the planning and building of Sunnyside and its construction by the City Housing Corporation, the design of the homes and gardens, and the tragedy of the Great Depression, when hundreds of families lost their homes. The second section examine how the garden suburbs outside London have been preserved and how aesthetic regulation is enforced in New York. The history of the preservation of Sunnyside Gardens is discussed in depth, as is the controversial proposal to place the Aluminaire House, an innovative housing prototype from the 1930s, on the only vacant site in the historic district. Sunnyside Gardens pays homage to a time when far-sighted and socially conscious architects and planners sought to build communities, not merely buildings, a spirit that has faded to near-invisibility

`We made Kinder Scout, not just metaphorically, or metaphysically, not just with our stories and our battles, but literally changed its shape, from the peat washing off its summit, to the drystone walls that turn the hillside into a harmonious grid, the trees that are and more often aren't there, to the creatures that we've allowed to remain and those we've done away with. It's our mountain.' In 1951 the Peak District was designated the UK's first national park: a commitment to protect and preserve our countryside and wild places. Sandwiched between Manchester and Sheffield, and sitting at the base of the Pennines, it is home to Kinder Scout, Britain's most popular `mountain', a beautiful yet featureless and disorientating plateau which barely scrapes the 600-metre contour, whose lower slopes bore witness in 1932 to a movement of feet, a pedestrian rebellion, which helped shape modern access legislation: the Kinder Mass Trespass. But Kinder Scout's story is about much more than the working class taking on the elite. Marked by the passage of millions of feet and centuries of farming, a graveyard for lost souls and doomed aircraft, this much-loved mountain is a sacred canvas on which mankind has scratched and scraped its likeness for millennia. It is a record of our social and political history, of conflict and community. Writer Ed Douglas and photographer John Beatty are close friends and have a shared history with Kinder going back decades. In this unique collaboration they reveal the social, political, cultural and ecological developments that have shaped the physical and human landscape of this enigmatic and treasured hill. Kinder Scout: The People's Mountain is a celebration of a northern English mountain and our role in its creation.

Dianne D'Cotta has always liked making records of her travel and local surroundings and a few years ago started to put together grids of 9 photos on different themes, to save space and tell a story. One day she posted one of them on social media and before long had a following, which has continued to grow. Interspersing small details like palm trees and signs with larger views of familiar places, this book includes the areas visitors know and love, such as the quirky shops along the high street, the long seafront and beautiful beaches, but also the places local people will recognise, such as Jacob's Ladder, Little Dennis and the Docks Choir. People love how she captures the historically interesting, seaside, arty, university, botanically diverse, foodie, community minded, working port town that is Falmouth.

In 1977, the iconic Swindon Works was building locomotives. By 1986, it was shut down. In The End of the Line, Ron Bateman recounts the fight to save Swindon Works, its 3,500 jobs and the livelihood of the entire community it represented. Initially joining through the Works Training School in 1977, Ron witnessed this tragic struggle and the crushing blow dealt to the industry that had defined Swindon for generations. Combining personal recollections with information and interviews from many other insiders and railmen, this book provides the only comprehensive chronicle on the final decade of 147 years of railway engineering and a fateful milestone in the history of Swindon.

Acknowledged as a classic of mountain writing, this book takes you into the bothies, howffs and dosses on the Scottish hills as Fishgut Mac, Desperate Dan and Stumpy the Big Yin stalk hill and public house, evading gamekeepers and Royalty.